Timothy Wiles is so squelchy, so zapped by synthetic technology that he had to change his name to Überzone. Since his 1996 debut single for the L.A. label City of Angels, Wiles has been relentless in his devotion to synthetically squelchy breakbeat electro.

Faith in the Future, Wiles' guest-heavy debut album, veers from summarizing his output since 1996's Space Kadet EP to pointing out the direction he sees breakbeat heading in. Thus, the album awkwardly divides in two: the first half showcases Wiles' forward-looking tunes; the second takes a brief historical look at his dated earlier work.

Bart Thomas and Bigg Robb of the Sure 2 B crew help Wiles out with the opening cut, "Beat Bionic." Amid the backspins and crawly scratches by Davey Dave and Wiles' filthy low-end analog squirms, Bigg Robb and his pal yell, "Fly, fly, supersonic!/ Check out the DJ!/ Go bionic!" Not happy with leaving them to their own yelling, Wiles vocodes, spins and pitch-bends their chants into all-too familiar contortions. On "Science Fiction," rulin' Jamaican toaster Beenie Man rants, "I'm living real life/ But it feels like science fiction," over a woofer-worrying dub-bass framework. Occasionally, Wiles will let a 303 squirm loose, but Beenie Man stands his ground and persists in his teaching.

The standout track on Faith in the Future lies in "Black Widow," Wiles' collaboration with nu-breaks pioneer, Rennie Pilgrem. Beginning with a mass of conga rolls and a Todd Edwards-ish slicing of a human voice, the track soon evolves into the sonic equivalent of the photophobic aliens in the sci-fi flick Pitch Black. Wiles and Pilgrem unleash searing acid stabs and caustic Roland 303 burps. The congas and belches rise in pitch and intensity until you can't imagine that anyone but the glued-on could remain a wallflower if your club DJ dropped this devastating joint.

With Davey Dave back on scratching detail, "Bounce" grabs hold of an old school breakbeat and throws acid loops and b-boy scratches over it in an attempt to throw it off course. But it's a disciplined break, and almost as unstoppable as "Black Widow." Electro-lady Lida Husik guests on "Dreamtime," adding a multi-layered, fractured phoneme vibe-- it almost recalls Laurie Anderson's classic "O Superman"-- to this atmospheric respite from the album's off-the-hook rhythmic frenzy.

The snapping snares of "Rhythm Device" ensure that we're tossed back into a seismic funk foment. Wiles slathers on filthy analog noise and slices in more Todd Edwards-ian cut-ups of Frank Gorshin's manic Riddler laughter. In a Josh Wink-type percussive build, a cylon instructs us to "spread love" before the fear of that aforementioned Pitch Black alien chase is proven utterly groundless.

Wiles drops the momentum for the dirge-like "Frequency" (featuring the world-weary and rote vocals of Helmet's Page Hamilton), and follows it with the brief and incongruously 808 State ambience of the album's title track. But wiles hopes that our faith in his electro will be restored with "2Kool4Skool." The track features Afrika Bambaataa, who apparently hasn't got off the losing streak that marred Leftfield's "Afrika Shox." Bambaataa contents himself with calling out his own name (as well as that of Soul Sonic Force), and stating the obvious fact that he's collaborating with Überzone. When he collaborated with Westbam, he dropped the mystical vision of, "Agharta, the City of Shamballa." If he didn't feel slighted when this track was originally released two years ago, Wiles should now feel justifiably scammed.

Crystal Method's Ken Jordan assists with the skippy mess of "Keep Go-in." Despite the "keep goin'!" exhortations of a sampled MC, the track sounds so hilariously amateurish that it sounds downloaded off the nothing-excluded slop-bucket of MP3.com. Then, "Little Dragon" returns to the squelchy balladry of "Dreamtime." Though dedicated with love and respect to Bruce Lee, the track's definitely aimed at a more feminine audience. Gone are the ear-bleed tactics, allowing the song to sway on Karen Lo's pouting (possibly Japanese) vocals. By now, we're really missing the lysergic energy of the album's first half.

Faith in the Future closes with "Botz (Synthetic Mix)," a track from 1996's Space Kadet EP which unmistakably and irrevocably shows its age-- it's nothing more than a sterile, professional remake of Josh Wink's acid breakbeat classic "Higher States of Consciousness."

The inclusion of outdated bric-a-brac such as "Botz" and "2Kool4Skool" challenges our faith in Wiles' future. If we're ever going to regard him as more than just a promising also-ran, his next album will have to lift off from the same launch pad as Faith in the Future. Only next time, he'd better not look back. At all.

-Paul Cooper, September 24th, 2001